24 hour FLASH raffle to train at elitefts s4 private training compound the Thursday (3/3/2016) before the Arnold Classic. Raffle begins at midnight and will run 24 hours. Ten winners will be selected on Wednesday. No purchase necessary

Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - An all-too-familiar dilemma may resurface now that the Moon is back in far-seeing Sagittarius. You are ready to choose between boldly charging ahead without a plan and waiting until you're fully prepared for the next step. You truly understand the wisdom of patience, but you still prefer to move quickly today. Your current drive for self-expression is powerful, so be sure to maximize the potential of the moment with a healthy dose of common sense. Ultimately, balance is the key to your success.

To sum it all up, the research concluded that it’s best to use several different exercises to build impressive shoulders. The best exercises for the anterior deltoid were: the Smith machine shoulder press, free-weight bench press, and pec deck. The best exercises for the middle deltoid were: the free-weight lateral raise, cable-crossover lateral raise, and reverse pec deck. For the posterior deltoid, the best exercises were: the reverse pec deck, incline lat pulldown, and seated row. - FLEX

The most fundamental thing to remember about your abs is that you will not be able to see them while that layer of fat is covering them. Thirty to 45 minutes of cardio three to four times a week is a great start. Obviously if you do more cardio the results will come quicker, but not in the form of more cardio per session, but more days. So optimally I would say five to six days a week for 45 minutes, keeping your heart rate in the 130–140 beats per minute range.

The bags, a backpack ($100) and duffle ($125), were created in partnership with Under Armour (Johnson signed an endorsement deal with the brand last year). The design is understated and unisex (in case you’re tired of neon, haha, right!), but there are enough pockets to store whatever you need…sneakers, wallet, sports bra, five water bottles, iPad, a flatiron, the latest issue of SELF magazine, and so on. The only thing that’s missing is an invite to work out with Johnson himself. (We’re waiting!)

Of Arnold’s many accomplishments, this one doesn’t rank particularly high. Still, not only did it allow him to name an exercise after himself—the Arnold Press—it’s a uniquely effective move. While Arnold was experimenting with ways to spark new shoulder growth , he rein­vented the overhead press, twisting the palms from facing backward to facing forward. He found that this better targets your front delts than conventional overhead presses. Like its namesake, this exercise travels a unique path. Add it to your shoulder routine.

Bananas : “They’re nature’s PowerBar,” says Dr. Louise Burke, head of Sports Nutrition at the Australian Institute of Sport and coauthor of The Complete Guide to Food for Sports Performance: Peak Nutrition for Your Sport . Bananas are loaded with digestible carbohydrates (read: fuel) and are packed with potassium, which aids in maintaining nerve and muscle function. The body doesn’t store potassium for very long, so a medium banana before a workout will help keep nutrient levels high. Villacorta especially recommends bananas for morning exercisers: “Get up and eat a medium banana with 1/2 cup of Greek yogurt. Wait about 30 minutes and then hit the gym. Your body will need the carbohydrates and protein.”

Those “skipping legs day” memes didn’t show up out of nowhere. So why do so many people find excuses to bail on their quads, hams, glutes, and calves? Because the challenge of shambling to the car with sweat-soaked clothes and shaky legs isn’t for everyone. But we’re willing to bet that it’s for you, right? You can get there with these tips provided by certified personal trainer, motivational speaker, and TV personality John Rowley .

Everyone gains weight in the winter. And that's totally fine. It's colder, there's less sun, and the holidays can be a killer. Some use the seasonal shift to their advantage by taking all of those extra calories and putting them into building slabs of muscle. Check out how that's done with the WINTER BULK UP program here . And then again, some might have just put on the blubber. But whether you spent your winter months getting bigger, for better or for worse, the next plan is for chopping you all up: The SPRING TRIM UP .

I’ve learned to work with what I have. Injuries happen when you combine a history of aggressive sports training and decades of training in the gym. Some will disagree and yes, some can go without injuries. There is a genetic component to durability, I believe. I’ve seen some horrific training do no harm to some yet I see very dialed in training beat others up.

ELIGIBILITY: The Bodybuilding.com Twitter contest (the "Contest") is open to Twitter members who are 18 years of age and older at the time of entry ("Contestant"). Membership and enrollment in Twitter are free. Contest is open only to legal residents of the United States and the District of Columbia (excluding Puerto Rico, Samoa, Guam, the US Virgin Islands and any other U.S. territories and protectorates, and individuals with an APO or FPO military address). Contestants may not be members of any guild, union or other organization that may prohibit them from participating in this Contest and that would restrict, require due payment or otherwise have the right to oppose such Contestant's participation in this Contest. Employees, contractors, members, and agents of Bodybuilding.com, LLC, Liberty Media Corporation (and companies owned by Liberty Media Corporation), and members of their immediate family (including spouses, parents, siblings, children and their respective spouses) and persons living in the same household with any such individual are ineligible. In order to be eligible, Contestant must follow these Rules.

Set the crash bars on a squat rack at about mid-thigh level. Unlike a conventional bar shrug the resistance will actually be behind you. This slight deviation stresses the mid traps more than a standard bar shrug. Hand placement on the bar can also serve as a way to recruit different parts of your traps. Try it with a close grip, shoulder width grip and just inside of a snatch grip to really tax the upper back from different areas. Perform 3 sets of 20-25 reps.

The first step to ensure size is the commitment to train on a regular basis. Despite you size and genetics, an extended layoff causes a decrease in size and strength. Atrophy can take hold in less than 72 hours. So to preserve hard-won muscular development, hit it hard and hit it often, hitting every bodypart at least once per week. Eight-time Mr. Olympia (1984-1991) Lee Haney recommends hitting each bodypart at least twice per week, although this may be a bit much for a great deal of us mere mortals.

Here are a few iso-tension tips. First, this isn’t a good technique to do with compound lifts that involve many areas. For example, deadlifts work too many muscles (spinal erectors, trapezius, glutes, quads, lats, etc.) to focus on just one. On the other hand, if the compound exercise has one primary muscle, applying iso-tension there can better direct the stress of your sets. As an example, ﬂ exing your chest between sets of bench presses can help you target your pecs (primary muscle) and use less of your delts and triceps (secondary muscles).

Class is in session. The subject is everyone’s favorite: arms. The teacher is Roelly Winklaar, fresh of a breakout year and owner of arguably the two best arms in the world. Anyone who wants to debate his arm superiority, raise your hand and wait to be called on. (We see you, Phil Heath.) Now, take careful notes as our teacher explains his arm alphabet. With a few digressions as the lecture progresses, these are the tenets of Winklaar’s bi and tri construction from A to Z.

On his way to a record-tying 8 Mr. Olympia victories, Coleman continually set a new precedent in back muscle and displayed an unrivaled combination of size and detail. The often-used claim, "contests are won from behind" was never more true during Ronnie's reign as King of the Olympia. And every grainy ounce of muscle was earned with heavy weight and hard work.